With some hesitation Leon informed his brother. The information which he gave confirmed the suspicions of Miss Fortescue. He had determined to be avenged on Edith and her father, and after that night on which Edith had escaped he had managed to procure a body in London from some of the body-snatchers who supplied the medical schools there. He had removed the head, and dressed it in the clothes which he had last worn. He had taken it to Dalton Park and put it in the well about a week after Edith's flight. He had never gone back to his room, but had purposely left it as it was, so as to make his disappearance the more suspicious. He himself had contrived to raise those frequent rumors which had arisen and grown to such an extent that they had terminated in the search at Dalton Park. Anonymous letters to various persons had suggested to them the supposed guilt of Edith, and the probability of the remains being found in the well.
The horror which Reginald felt at this disclosure was largely mitigated by the fact that he had already imagined some such proceeding as this, for he had felt sure that it was a trick, and therefore it had only been left to account for the trick.
The next thing which Reginald had to investigate was the mock marriage. But here he did not choose to question Leon directly about Edith. He rather chose to investigate that earlier marriage with Miss Fortescue.
By this time Leon's objections to confess had vanished. The inducements which Reginald held out were of themselves attractive enough to one in his desperate position, and, what was more, he felt that there was no alternative. Having once begun, he seemed to grow accustomed to it, and spoke with greater freedom.
To Reginald's immense surprise and relief, Leon informed him that the marriage with Miss Fortescue was not a mock marriage at all. For once in his life he had been honest. The marriage had been a real one. It was only after the affair in the Dalton vaults that he had pretended that it was false. He did so in order to free himself from his real wife, and gain some control over the Dalton estate. The Rev. Mr. Porter was a bona fide clergyman, and the marriage had been conducted in a legal manner. He had found out that the Rev. Mr. Porter had gone to Scotland, and saw that he could easily deceive his wife.
“But,” said Reginald, “what is the reason that your wife could never find him out? She looked over all the lists of clergymen, and wrote to all of the name of Porter. She could not find him.”
“Naturally enough,” said Leon, indifferently. “She supposed that he belonged to the Church, because he used the Church service; but he was a Presbyterian.”
“Where is he now?”
“When last I heard about him he was at Falkirk.”
“Then Miss Fortescue was regularly married, and is now your wife?”